What is an unpopular belief that you hold about the college application process?

[Anonymous]

Test optional has made a joke out of college admissions. I can’t think of another country that doesn’t have some sort of an entrance exam (like A levels). Kids are getting into schools without remotely the intellectual aptitude previously expected. It just seems a race to the bottom.

[Anonymous]

For a bunch of reasons (especially logistics), for American students, attending Canadian universities makes a lot more sense than attending British universities.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Test optional has made a joke out of college admissions. I can’t think of another country that doesn’t have some sort of an entrance exam (like A levels). Kids are getting into schools without remotely the intellectual aptitude previously expected. It just seems a race to the bottom.

I agree with this, but kids should only be able to take the SAT exam once, so the rich don't get to prep and take it 5 times and pretend their 1500 score is meritocratic.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Test optional has made a joke out of college admissions. I can’t think of another country that doesn’t have some sort of an entrance exam (like A levels). Kids are getting into schools without remotely the intellectual aptitude previously expected. It just seems a race to the bottom.

I agree with this, but kids should only be able to take the SAT exam once, so the rich don't get to prep and take it 5 times and pretend their 1500 score is meritocratic.

There are things that can be done. Schools could administer the test and it can be offered on one day. That’s it. Prepping/studying can’t be avoided, but with things like Kahn Academy being free, there are opportunities for preparation without financial barriers. All inequities will never disappear — that’s life, but simply eliminating a standardized gauge of competency is creating a much more perverse result that really isn’t good for anyone and definitely not for our educational system.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:People who understand college as primarily a trade or technical school, rather than as a means to become more cultured, will never break into the social circles of the elite.

100%

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People who understand college as primarily a trade or technical school, rather than as a means to become more cultured, will never break into the social circles of the elite.

100%

Absolutely untrue. College drop-outs are the mega-elite these days.

[Anonymous]

The current application process is developmentally unhealthy and opposite of what educators should support and creates anxious, cynical young adults.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you have to take out loans to pay for an 85k year school, you are better off going to an in state flagship. The benefits of going to those “elite” schools are practically non existent for students not of a wealthy background, and in fact the crushing debt will set students of a middle class background back even further on the socioeconomic ladder of life.

Idk with the exception of the super elite schools if you are motivated to take advantage of it. Like if you get into HYP and want to major in Econ and go to Wall Street, go for it! It will pay off.

I hate to be the one to break it to you but those wall street jobs right out of college are going to the children of the wealthy and well connected. They don’t get the job because they went to yale, they go to yale because they come from the kind of people who get those jobs.

Quant geniuses can come from any background, of course, (and frankly more likely to come from the hoi polli who have experience with grinding their way through public education) but it is far cheaper and easier to do that via the ole drop out of a physics phd program loophole versus the modern day indentured servitide system of student loans

Thanks for letting me know, 25 years post graduating HYP and working on Wall Street with no family connections at all

I am glad to hear of your success. But surely by now you must understand how exceptional you are.

[Anonymous]

It doesn’t matter where you go to college. At all. It’s all going to come down to your personality and work ethic when you graduate as long as you get a degree from anywhere. Charismatic people with good social skills and a decent work ethic will do well no matter what.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Test optional has made a joke out of college admissions. I can’t think of another country that doesn’t have some sort of an entrance exam (like A levels). Kids are getting into schools without remotely the intellectual aptitude previously expected. It just seems a race to the bottom.

If schools don’t like it, they will change.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It doesn’t matter where you go to college. At all. It’s all going to come down to your personality and work ethic when you graduate as long as you get a degree from anywhere. Charismatic people with good social skills and a decent work ethic will do well no matter what.

If you don’t have a good personality and/or work ethic though, where you went to college can still open more doors than you would think.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
The current application process is developmentally unhealthy and opposite of what educators should support and creates anxious, cynical young adults.

Yes. And the “winners” wind up in groups composed almost entirely of exceptionally cynical and anxious young adults. It’s absolutely toxic.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:For a bunch of reasons (especially logistics), for American students, attending Canadian universities makes a lot more sense than attending British universities.

But then you’d be in Canada.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That it’s not worth the stress and pressure to play a sport in college.

D1 I would agree.
D3 It has made all the difference to my child's happiness and adjustment to school.

If she plays, then what would you know about D1? My DD is good enough to play D1 and is also happy and adjusting well to a top 20 school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That top colleges just serve wealthy, connected families and UMC of color.

That many kids who get into top schools lie on their applications.

Lie about what?

The fact that they are Native American.